By Brian Murphy, WRAL

Five years after its long-awaited launch, the ACC Network has delivered on its biggest promises: more revenue for the league’s schools, more exposure for the school’s athletics programs and more availability of those program’s games across the nation.

But the network, which celebrates its fifth anniversary with special programming Thursday, and the underlying agreements attached to it haven’t been able to provide the league with something it’s craved for more than a decade: stability.

Launched Aug. 22, 2019, just months before a global pandemic upended college athletics along with most other aspects of American life and at a time of disruption to the cable bundle, the network has adapted its way through the tumult to become a vital part of the conference experience for players, coaches and fans.

“The idea of having a network is a really big deal,” said NC State athletics director Boo Corrigan, whose father was ACC commissioner from 1985 to 1997. “There’s three conferences that have one and we’re awful proud that we do.”

The most obvious measure of the network’s success is what it contributes to the league’s bottom line. The year before the ACC Network launched the ACC made $288.6 million from its television rights, according to the league’s federal tax forms.

In the 2022-23 academic year, the last year for which data is available, the league made $481.7 million from its television rights — an increase of nearly 67% from its final pre-network year.

ESPN owed the league $270.3 million in television rights base payments for the 2022-23 academic year, according to a legal filing by the Florida State University Board of Trustees against the ACC. The ACC Network evenly splits revenue between ESPN and the ACC.

“An unequivocal success,” said Jeramy Michiaels, an ESPN senior director who oversees the ACC Network and manages ESPN’s relationship with the league. “From a revenue and a sales standpoint, I would say it’s exceeded our expectations. I would say it is extraordinarily successful.”

The ACC generated a league-record $706.6 million in 2022-23, third among conferences, a figure that is expected to continue to rise. ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips touted the ACC’s position relative to other leagues, saying the ACC expects to remain third in the years to come — behind the SEC and Big Ten — in total revenue and per-school payout.

The league saw a significant jump in 2022 when the network got carriage on Comcast in late 2021. The ACC Network will play a big part in any future increases. The base rate, as outlined in the Florida State complaint, increases by 4.5% annually.

Michiaels said the ACC Network will receive in-market carriage rates from cable and satellite companies in Northern California and Dallas — two of the 10 largest markets in the nation — after adding California, Stanford and SMU over the summer in a divided expansion vote.

The network receives money from each subscriber, but those subscribers counted as in-market pay considerably more than those deemed out-of-market. The Sports Business Journal reported in 2019 that the ACC Network would be close to the SEC Network’s fees, which were around $1.30 per month for in-market subscribers and around 25 cents per month for out-of-market subscribers.

The ACC Network doesn’t get official ratings, so it doesn’t show up in the weekly viewership numbers and ratings totals — metrics that are often now fodder for bragging rights and realignment interest.

“One of the things that I’m focused on every single day is growing viewership,” Michiaels said. “They’ve been double-digit percentage growth year over year over year. I’m very proud of that fact. I think that’s only going to grow with the new territories that we’re in, with the new fan bases that are coming into the league.”

Getting a network

In 2010, the ACC agreed to a 12-year deal with ESPN to start the next year. With conference realignment rampant, the deal was restructured in 2012 and again in 2013 into a 15-year agreement to begin with the 2012-13 season and last through 2027. The league’s members signed a grant of rights in 2013.

“There are three things that FSU is keenly interested in,” Florida State President Eric Barron told the Orlando Sentinel in 2013. “One is stability, a second is that we have revenues that are competitive and a third is to have what will be an ACC network that helps further our brand and also adds resources.”

Charter member Maryland announced in 2012 it would leave the ACC for the Big Ten, prompting the desire for stability and the grant of rights. Media reports at the time hailed the signing of the grant of rights as “effectively halting the exodus of any schools to other conferences,” according to ESPN.com.

The Big Ten launched its Fox-backed conference network in 2007.

The SEC launched its ESPN-backed conference network in 2014. By that time, the ACC was pushing ESPN for a network of its own.

In 2016, then-ACC commissioner John Swofford announced a new 20-year agreement with ESPN and the 2019 launch date of the ACC Network. Swofford was flanked by school presidents, athletic directors and coaches.

“There’s no question that these new agreements with ESPN competitively position the Atlantic Coast Conference for the long-term, both from a financial perspective and from a programming content,” Swofford said at the time.

Clemson President Jim Clements led the league’s Council of Presidents during the 2016 extension negotiations, and Florida State athletic director Stan Wilcox was the chair of the league’s athletics directors during the final stages of the negotiations.

“Looking ahead to the immediate and long-term future, the ACC Network will provide incredible benefits to our universities and student-athletes,” Clements said at the time. “This is a monumental time for the Atlantic Coast Conference, and it speaks volumes that this agreement, along with the grant of rights, was supported unanimously by the ACC Council of Presidents.”

The joy and togetherness would not last.

Less than eight years later, both Florida State and Clemson sued the ACC seeking more favorable exit terms from the league.

Swofford said at the event that the “new media agreement with ESPN that extends through 2035-36.”

In its complaint, filed in late December, Florida State raised objections, alleging that the ACC “verbally represented to its members that ESPN had issued an ultimatum”: agree to a grant of rights through 2036 or there would be no network. The lawsuit said the television agreement runs through 2027 and that ESPN has an exclusive nine-year option to extend the deal.

No guarantee of success

A network itself is not a guarantee of success or stability for the conference.

The Mountain West launched the nation’s first conference network in 2006. It ended in 2012 with high-profile defections from the league in between.

The Pac-12 Networks, launched in 2012 without the backing of a major television partner, struggled for distribution. It shut down in July as league members scattered to conferences across the country, including Cal and Stanford to the ACC.

The network decision paid off handsomely for the Big Ten and, subsequently, the SEC.

The Big Ten and SEC each generated more than $850 million in 2022-23, according to their federal tax documents. The SEC reported earning $544.3 million from its television rights. The Big Ten did not break down where its $794.5 million in “sports revenue” came from.

Of course, those leagues launched before the great unbundling of cable, a particular issue for ESPN. And those leagues are filled with extremely large (Big Ten) and extremely passionate (SEC) fan bases from big public universities. The ACC is a mix of public schools and smaller private schools that, taken together, don’t produce the sheer number of alumni or intensity in fandom.

In other words, success was not assured.

“The ACC Network you see today is not the ACC Network that we launched with,” Michiaels said. “Part of that is out of necessity, simply because the conference has grown. The landscape of college athletics has grown.”

He added: “The adaptability of what we do as a network, and that speaks to the resources and the power of ESPN and the brand power of the ACC, those two things combined give us the ability to be adaptive to what is happening and what’s changing in the landscape.”

This year brings a new challenge: The network is programming and integrating teams on two coasts, trying to be cognizant of travel impacts while making an attractive schedule.

The new, large markets should help the ACC Network’s revenues, which is split 50-50 between ESPN and ACC.

“We’re very careful to not be part of the expansion discussion,” Michiaels said. “So the conference will come to us and ask us questions that are more about what markets are advantageous, but we’re very, very careful to not be part of talking about specific schools.

“There was sort of a misperception that ESPN is involved and has control of that, and we absolutely do not. We will answer questions to the extent that we feel like we can, and we did with the ACC, but this was solely the ACC’s decision, and we’re excited about it.”

ESPN will have an opportunity to prove how excited it is about the ACC soon enough. It must exercise its nine-year option by February. The Florida State and Clemson lawsuits and ACC countersuits seem unlikely to be completed at that point.

“Our partnership with ESPN is not going away. It’s not going away,” Phillips said in July. “We have talked to them about additional resources and how do we monetize it. We’re 50-50 partners on that, They’re as motivated as we are to generate more revenue for the overall television deal. I’m very optimistic about where we’re going with them. They understand the importance.”

Exposure for ACC teams, programs

Among the network’s original premises was that it would deliver for more than just football and men’s basketball. It covers those sports plenty, too.

“The network will shine a spotlight on all your 27 sports and your thousands of student-athletes,” then-ESPN President John Skipper said to the presidents, athletic directors and coaches in attendance at the 2016 announcement.

The linear network and its digital companion, ACC Network Extra, air more than 1600 events with as many as 70% produced on campus, Michiaels said. Corrigan said the experience for students and others is invaluable.

“We’re providing a lot of opportunities for young people getting started in their career,” Corrigan said.

NC State, like other schools, has an on-campus production facility and keeps adding to it with additional equipment.

“And it’s real competition. Our coaches want really good broadcasts as we’re doing this so it’s something we spend a lot of time on,” Corrigan said. “You want to know that when you look at the button on the screen, that you don’t know that it’s ACC Network or ESPN or ESPN2 or whatever else it is and it just maintains a certain quality.”

Moore said recruits are often familiar with his program from having seen games on the network and families appreciate the ability to watch their daughters play more often without travel.

One of Phillips’ first big wins as ACC commissioner was to get the rights to the women’s basketball tournament and baseball championship added to ESPN for airing on ACC Network. They had been with Raycom.

The network announced that it would have live game coverage of 28 women’s soccer, 23 men’s soccer, 20 volleyball and 18 field hockey games or matches this fall. That includes full tournament coverage of field hockey.

“We’re lucky to be able to have such a strong band of universities that really represent field hockey in America very well,” said UNC field hockey coach Erin Matson, whose team claimed the national title in 2023. “So for the network to realize that and reward that, it means so much especially in a time right now in college sports where Olympic sports and everybody basically, except basketball and football, are literally fighting for their lives.

“The ACC Network has been nothing but supportive, and they just listen and they cover us, and they’ve done a wonderful job ever since I was wearing the uniform to now representing the Heels as a head coach.”

Finding its voice

The SEC Network quickly produced a breakout star in Paul Finebaum, a longtime columnist and radio host in Alabama, who has become an essential college football voice across ESPN shows. His SEC-centric appearances have not helped with the perception, fair or not, that ESPN is more invested in the SEC than ACC, both leagues for which it owns all television rights.

It’s also led to concern that the ACC Network doesn’t have its own version, helping to shape the narrative around college football in particular. That concern was particularly acute when undefeated ACC champion Florida State was left out of the four-team College Football Playoff in 2023.

“Paul is one of one,” Michiaels said.

The ACC Network’s signature show at launch was “Packer and Durham,” featuring two veterans with deep, deep ties to the ACC in Mark Packer and Wes Durham. While the show has been canceled, both still have huge roles at the network: Packer as host of ACC PM, a weekday show, and Durham as play-by-play announcer for the Saturday primetime football game.

“When I turn on a game that Wes Durham is calling, it just sounds like the ACC,” Michiaels said. “And I love hearing Wes Durham call a game.”

Other ACC Network voices are getting attention, too. Kelsey Riggs, one of the ACC Network’s founding hires, is moving to SportsCenter full-time. Michiaels mentioned the growing profile of former Florida State and NFL quarterback EJ Manuel across ESPN platforms.

“We love the talent lineup that we have, and we’re constantly on the lookout for other voices that can represent the ACC and speak highly of the ACC brand and really trumpet the accomplishments of the teams,” Michiaels said.

Can those voices get heard across the ESPN universe of shows, especially ones that cater to a college sports audience?

“You want the next step of the access to those shows — College GameDay and SportsCenter — with those people for a national brand lift,” Corrigan said. “That’s a big part of it is really making sure that people understand what the ACC is and what we’re about.”

Source: wralsportsfan.com